


moments the words don't reach

by VesperNexus



Series: that boy is mine [3]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Hurt No Comfort, Idiots in Love, M/M, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:55:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23410567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VesperNexus/pseuds/VesperNexus
Summary: “When you’re found out-” Hamilton looks like he’s about to object, but Laurens cannot let him, “what will you have? You would throw away your shot for him?”“Yes.”Or, two conversations. One goes better than the other.
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton & John Laurens, Alexander Hamilton/George Washington
Series: that boy is mine [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1677175
Comments: 9
Kudos: 71





	moments the words don't reach

**Author's Note:**

> i. should be studying.
> 
> I needed some Ham&Laurens cute friendship but all that happened was sad. i see the end of this series in about half a dozen fics, and this excites me.

“Oh _George_.”

Hamilton is ravished and breathless in his ear, thin fingers slowly uncurling from his broad shoulders. He is devastatingly careful with his boy, trembling and pliant as he curls into Washington’s broad chest, flattens his palms on soft flesh pulled taut over his heartbeat. Washington tucks Hamilton’s head beneath his chin, his own hands gentle as they step down the jutting staircase of his spine, leisurely stumbling to his hips.

“Are you alright, son?” A contended sigh tickles his neck. Washington blinks once, twice, lets his gaze fall heavy on Hamilton, bathed in a subtle silvery light that makes his skin glow. The shadows underneath his eyes are as severe as ever, and the skin over his cheekbones is pulled tight, face hollowed by hunger. Hamilton’s lashes flutter slowly as he comes to himself, eyes owlish and bright. Mouth turned in a crescent of a smile, almost impish in its devious knowingness.

Ethereal. His boy is ethereal.

“I can’t believe I’ll miss this for a whole week.”

The petulance is there, in the twist of his lips and the tickle of fingers against Washington’s ribs. He grips his boy tighter, hands heavy on all the slivers of flesh he left so tender and used.

“It’s _only_ a week,” he consoles, but the words feel stunted and awkward even to his own ears. Washington wishes desperately to keep his boy tucked against him forever, but Hamilton has been requested specifically by Knox. Washington has never felt such irrational resentment towards his old friend. “You’ll be back before I know you’re gone.”

The boy roles his eyes and Washington smothers a laugh in the hollow of his throat. Cold toes jerk against his shins and the room is filled with breezy laughter.

“Come on old man, admit you’ll miss me.”

Washington tugs his aide, tumbling the slim body over his own. His hands frame Hamilton’s delicate jaw and he pulls him down, down, down, tongue slipping between obedient lips in a searing kiss. Hamilton makes lovely little sounds into his mouth, the taste of his laughter sweet and ripe. When he pulls away for breath, Hamilton’s hands are folded under his chin, poised delicately over Washington’s chest. Their legs are irretrievably tangled together, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

They watch each other for some time. His palms twist around the slim slip of his boy’s waist, resting on his jutting curves.

“I…” Hamilton glances away for the briefest second. The playful sway of his voice is pensive, and Washington feels the barest murmur of a stuttering heart against his own. He can almost taste the sudden anxiety in the air. “I should speak to John, before I go.”

Ah. Washington lets his head fall hard against the pillow. Childishly, he was hoping to avoid talking about Laurens in their bed. Alas.

“Are you sure it’s the right time?” Washington twists his fingers gently through those silky tumbling locks.

“I won’t be able to think straight otherwise. It’s been… difficult, of late.” He feels those shoulders slump in defeat, Hamilton’s negligible weight growing heavy against him. “I know he said he won’t divulge what he’s seen, but…” The words feel dense, dripping like syrup off the role of his silver tongue. “It doesn’t feel right. To leave things as they are. He’s my closest friend and I hate how…”

it’s too difficult. His boy collapses fully into him, head lolling against his shoulder. Washington wishes terribly he could do more to fix this.

His fingers move in Hamilton’s hair, stroking, petting. The boy _purrs_ in delight, and it does things to Washington he’s far too old to keep up with. “Laurens cares a great deal for you, Alexander.”

“Mmm.” A long moment slips between them. “He doesn’t trust me to make my own decisions.”

Washington can’t help but scoff. Hamilton raises his head at the uncharacteristic antic. “Can you blame him, Alex? He sees this as any man of sense and rationality. A commanding officer coercing his young aide-”

“Young _dashingly handsome_ aide-”

“ _Alexander._ ” He sighs when there’s a moody silence, corrects himself, “Young _dashingly handsome aide_ into his bed.” The attempt at light-heartedness doesn’t quite land, but there’s little to be done for it. “Alexander, surely you-”

The boy rolls his eyes. “I know, _I know._ He’s being protective, _I know that_ , but I’m still afraid he’s going to challenge you to a duel to protect my honour.”

Washington’s hands slip to the dip of his lower back, “I don’t think he has to worry about you _honour_.”

Hamilton honest to god _giggles_ , and Washington pulls his boy into another searing kiss. The moonlight cuts their skin into crystals, and for a moment, they pretend everything is okay.

*

Hamilton finds him at first light, sitting on the jagged edge of a rock by the stream. Laurens lets his eyes roam in a customary glance – no limp, no cuts, no bruises _that he can see._ His friend is dressed in a heavy coat a little too big for him, the sleeves hanging loose and long down his thin wrists, and Laurens can’t help but wonder what he’s hiding _underneath._ He swallows the inferno raging on his tongue, forces the fire down the passage of his throat to simmer in his belly. It’s not _Hamilton_ he’s angry at, after all. And there’s little cause to upset his friend when he leaves in an hour’s time.

Instead, he musters his best smile, but it doesn’t seem to settle comfortably on his face. Hamilton sees right through it, of course, eyes dipping guilty as he settles beside Laurens on the rock.

“I wanted to bid you farewell in person,” his words are soft but honest, and Laurens yearns to pull him into his arms, “I won’t see you for a week yet.”

He turns, and Hamilton’s looking at him with those big soulful eyes and Laurens _loves, loves, loves_ the man, he _does,_ but he looks into those big soulful eyes and sees the shadow of a powerful insidious man and _hates_ it. He averts his gaze, lips pressed into a hard line.

Hamilton physically withers, shoulders sinking. The hand reaching for Laurens’ sleeve stutters uncertainly, tucked back against his own chest.

“You won’t even look at me?”

Laurens swallows, finds a loose ripple in the river. It quivers with the snarling wind, pulled right and left, gliding smooth and silver over the rocks.

“Do I disgust you so?”

He can’t. Lauren’s _can’t._ “You know you don’t, Alexander. You know you can never.” _You can do no wrong in my eyes, Alexander._ “That isn’t what this is about.”

His friend’s anxiety is palpable, the urgency pulling his frame rigid painfully tangible. “Talk to me Laurens, _please._ ”

Laurens twists, twists until he faces Hamilton, until his hands slip to those slim upper arms and his grip is bruising. “Blinded. _You’re blinded,_ Alexander!” It’s incensed and livid, a rehash of a conversation they’ve already had. Laurens has enough sense to pitch his voice low. “He’s taking advantage of you, and you’re blinded by your reverence, your veneration, your misshapen god-worship.”

But Hamilton’s shaking his head again, and Laurens know it’s useless. His friend is as deaf as he is blind. “You don’t understand, Laurens, John, please just-”

“ _Alexander._ ” His friend presses his lips together, doesn’t speak for once. It’s not anymore comforting. “It’s perverted and abnormal, what he’s doing to you. He’s your commander! The incongruence in your power alone-”

“He loves me.”

_Oh Providence. Oh._

Lauren’s _can’t._

He lets go of Hamilton, feels his chest seize painfully. Laurens stands, steps away from the rock, from his friend, paralysed and overwhelmed by Hamilton’s inability to _see_ , by his own inability to _show_ him, help him, fix-

“Laurens! _Listen to me._ ” But he just shakes his head. His own failings suffocate him, a fist clenched tight around the hollow of his throat. When the tryst is uncovered, Washington will have his power and his status and money with roots so old it still sprouts trees, and Hamilton will have _nothing,_ will be _nothing,_ the flame of a candle snuffed out audaciously.

“When you’re found out-” Hamilton looks like he’s about to object, but Laurens cannot let him, “what will _you_ have? You would throw away your shot _for him?_ ”

“Yes.”

Laurens screams, almost manic in his vehemence. “Alexander, you are _blinded!_ He is using you!”

“Laurens, please, just let me bid you farewell in good spirits, that would be enough, my dear Laurens.” Christ, won’t he stop _begging_? He tries again, “Laurens I-”

“No!”

The edges of Laurens’ vision blur, tears pooling around his eyelashes. Hamilton steps over the rock, hands stretched out to him, but Laurens evades. “Just listen to me!”

He’s too loud, they’re too loud, but in that moment, Laurens feels his best friend slip away, driven by madness, and he’s useless to stop the flagrant self-destruction and –

“Hamilton! He is _using_ you, using you as if you were your mother!”

The wind seems to still. Laurens feels bile crawl up his throat as he says the words, and _fuck_ , Hamilton –

His friend becomes small. Hamilton is short and slim as a shadow, but he is never _small_ , he seizes space and occupies it with purpose until he’s the highest and proudest chin in the room, and he becomes _small._

“Is that what you think of me, my dear Laurens?” His voice is punctured with heartbreak, words stuttering and quiet. “A whore? A whore’s son?”

“Alexander…”

But his friend looks away abruptly, and in the shallow sunlight Laurens catches the wet gleam of tears on his cheeks. When he speaks again, his voice is without intonation, without sentiment altogether.

“I shall see you again in a week’s time.”

Laurens says nothing, has nothing to say. He nods, the formality unnatural and awkward between them.

He leaves, and Laurens does not stop him.


End file.
